Treatment of Depression and Green Walk

New green agenda for mental health. With a mass of new and growing evidence, Mind calls for ecotherapy to be recognised as a clinically-valid frontline treatment for mental health problems. As 93 per cent of GPs have prescribed drugs due to a lack of alternatives and access to Cognitive Behavioural Therapy takes up to four years in some areas of the UK, it is vital that ecotherapy is considered by GPs alongside these as a treatment option.

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Ecotherapy involves getting outdoors and getting active in a green environment as a way of boosting mental wellbeing. Whether it's taking regular walks in the park, flying a kite or participating in a gardening therapy project, green exercise is proven to have huge benefits for mental health. The prescription of care farms as a treatment for mental distress has been highly successful on the continent but the UK is lagging far behind Europe

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Botulinum toxin A, also known as Botox, could be a welcome wrinkle in the treatment of depression. A new report presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association noted that the drug beat placebo in managing this all-too-common condition.

I recently wrote a book on treating anxiety disorders, Anxiety Protocol, and asked a psychiatrist colleague to review the book. He stated he liked the book very much, and was in full agreement with the recommendation of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) as first-line treatment for anxiety disorders. However, he disagreed initially with my recommendation that prescription medication for anxiety disorder should be last resort treatment, and only then should be prescribed for severe cases or for psychotherapy-resistant cases. My colleague went on to opine that in moderate to severe cases, he saw the use of prescription medication “in association” with CBT, or as an adjunct to CBT, not as a “last resort.” Otherwise, he found contents of the book very useful.

In a first study published in the journal Lancet researchers have found mindfulness therapy, also known as cognitive behavioral therapy to be as effective as antidepressant medications that can often have side effects that are intolerable.

It’s still too early to tell, but treating severe depression could be a matter of giving a dose of laughing gas. No joke. Results of a proof-of-concept clinical trial suggest that nitrous oxide could be a quick and temporary treatment for depression that has not responded to other therapy.